“Arriving gratefully is the stance we take when confronting adversity. It is the deep knowledge that what is before us may not be desired, but we can control our response despite whatever chaos is around us.”

Joe Primo, CEO of Grateful Living

Gratitude is a feeling you experience in response to something you want, such as a desired outcome or someone giving you a gift. The challenge with focusing solely on gratitude is that it is highly dependent on external circumstances outside of your individual control. Gratitude comes easily when things are going well, but how can you connect with gratitude when life inevitably gets challenging?

From Gratitude to Gratefulness

Living gratefully is a way of being — an orientation for how you show up to and navigate your life — that can provide you with a deeper and unconditional experience of gratitude.

Unlike gratitude, living gratefully does not require the right conditions or outside circumstances to provide the outcome you want in any given situation. This way of being is not positive thinking, silver lining, or optimism. Rather, gratefulness acknowledges the joys and sorrows that permeate life and tends to them with an openness to unexpected opportunities, growth, increased perspective, and deeper social connections. Living gratefully empowers you to approach life with the capacity for discovering meaning and purpose no matter what happens.

As Br. David-Steindl Rast says, “We cannot be grateful for all that a given moment brings us; yet, in any given moment, we can be grateful for something. The gift within the gift of any given moment is opportunity.” When you practice grateful living on a daily basis, you recognize that you possess the ability to courageously live life to its fullness.

Deepening Resources:

What is Grateful Living?

Grateful living is the transformative practice that supports gratefulness through both times of joy and adversity — the expected and unexpected experiences that fill a lifetime. 

As a practice, grateful living serves as a pathway that equips you with a skill set and perspective that liberates you from the burdens of perfection and shame, and it empowers you to be more fully alive. This approach awakens you to the opportunity present in each moment, helping you to discover profound meaning in an ordinary day. By embracing a practice of grateful living, you are invited to step into a revolutionary way of being.

While Grateful living is defined by a set of principles and a framework to support your unique lived experience, its foundational practice Stop.Look.Go  also helps you cultivate greater joy.

Guiding Practice of Grateful Living: Stop.Look.Go

The guiding practice of grateful living enhances your ability to be present, expands your perspective, and awakens you to possibility. It has three main components:

  1. Stop. Cultivate Presence.
  2. Look. Cultivate Perspective.
  3. Go. Cultivate Possibility.

Watch the video below for an introduction to Stop.Look.Go:

Deepening Resources:

Our website is filled with inspiration and guidance to support you in the practice of grateful living. Explore our extensive Content Library, join our global community and Grateful Gatherings to connect with others around the globe who are practicing grateful living, and discover our range of daily practices and programs.


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